"Backwards Forwards Back," a play at Kansas City's Unicorn Theatre, takes a deeply personal dive into a soldier's everyday battles with post-traumatic stress disorder.
Struggling to find an effective treatment, the character in the one-person play shows how virtual reality slowly helps a service member cope with PTSD.
The character is "learning how to live in the real world by living in virtual one," playwright Jacqueline Goldfinger said.
Veterans Affairs psychologist Dr. Billy Rutherford told Up To Date that exposure therapy is the gold standard for treating PTSD.
"Talking through and experiencing the emotions and the thoughts and memories on a repeated basis can really have the stress response kind of activate, but then kind of crest over like a wave each time," Rutherford said. "And with practice, that wave becomes less intense. So it opens up your ability to process things a lot more clearly."
- Jacqueline Goldfinger, playwright, "Backwards Forwards Back"
- Dr. Billy Rutherford, clinical psychologist, Hershel "Woody" Williams VA
- Logan Black, director, "Backwards Forwards Back"
